Plan For Success

Plan For Success

Plan For Success

I guess the question here is whether or not the word “Plan” in Plan for Success is a noun or a verb, right? In other words, do you have a plan for success or are you planning for success? I guess it depends on you. Is it something tangible that you have already done or is it something you are currently planning for? Put yet another way, if a very important person were going to come to your house, you have a plan in your head for how you would want things to be, but during the time that they were on the way, you would be planning for it and preparing. The question with success then is, do you need to have a plan in order to achieve success or do you need to be planning in order to achieve it? The answer is, yes. I heard someone say a few years ago that the average man will spend more time picking out a nice tie than he will in picking his career. I can say for me, he was right.

I had an idea I wanted to get into Engineering, but I wasn’t really sure which Engineering Discipline. I finally decided when I saw a demonstration of liquefaction where water is introduced into soil and shaken violently, as in an earthquake, and the soil begins to act like a liquid. I was hooked. Yet, there are still different directions to go with Civil Engineering. How did I decide to become a Geotechnical Engineer and get into Construction Materials Testing? Simple. Somebody hired me. I had no real Plan For Success, I just wanted to get my Civil Engineering Degree and get hired by somebody. If a transportation company had hired, me, I would be a Transportation Engineer. If a Structural Engineering Company had hired me, I would be a Structural Engineer. You get the idea, right? I figured, I would go to work for someone and then, if I didn’t like it, I could always change and go do something else. Well, how is THAT for a Plan for Success? If I had seen a really cool demonstration of electricity during that time, who knows, I may have gone into Electrical Engineering. You get the idea. I really had no Plan for Success and all I wanted to do was get a degree, get a job, make money and see where it went. That is not a Plan For Success, that is a Plan For Failure and for making someone else rich!

Plan For Success – It’s not something that just happens

Having said that Success is not something that just happens, there are people who seem to go through life and they have no plan and they are just in the right place at the right time. You likely know some of them, right? We all do. BUT, those people are few and far between. Typically, success only comes to those who plan for it. Now, there is a big difference between being content with what happens to you and really having a plan for success and going for it. If you are willing to be a dead fish and just float along with the river, then, there is not much need for having a true plan for success. BUT, if you want to achieve great things, they aren’t just going to happen to you. You need to have a plan to get them done and then find a mentor. I heard someone say that the easiest way to become successful is to find someone who has done, or is doing, what you really want to do. Convince them to mentor you and then outwork them. There is a lot of truth to that, but I would also suggest that you need to work smart. You can move a ton of dirt with a wheelbarrow and a shovel. You can do it faster by working harder, but, why not get a backhoe and a dump truck and make one trip? You get the idea.

Plan For Success – What We Do

Regardless of what you do, you need to be intentional about it. As a Disciples of Jesus Christ, we have been commanded to go into all of the world and make disciples, baptizing them and teaching them the things that have been taught to us. It is intentional. We have to go find people and be fishers of men. We don’t hope the fish jump in the boat. Similarly, it’s the same with our Beachbody Coaching business. We have been given a great opportunity because I ordered P90X and lost 80 lbs during my first couple of rounds of doing it. But, just because we signed up as Coaches does not automatically give us a Plan For Success. As Coaches, we have to workout. We have to be products of the product. We also have to share and talk to people about the products that we know need to lose weight and get in shape as well as the business opportunity.

We have to have a Plan For Success and not just hope and wish that those things that we want to happen, will, just because we wish for them to. There has to be a Plan For Success and then, here it comes, the “w” word…you have to WORK. In fact, I heard someone say, work like it depends on you and pray like it depends on God. So, my advice is, have a plan, get a mentor, duplicate others successes and do it smarter, never give up, work hard and pray. If you do those things, you will be well on your way.

As a parting note, sometimes it’s hard and you will actually have to swim against the current. But when you get there, it will be worth it because you’ve had a Plan For Success!!

I think so many commenters are missing the point, thinking that the argument of this article puts good grades at odds with true learning. I agree with this article. The irony about getting good grades is that you will be most successful in achieving them when you are driven by something BEYOND it. Grades can probably get you in the door since as someone pointed out, scanning through so many applicants via their grades is so much easier than evaluating the true knowledge and skill of a person. That takes time. But if you got in the door only with high grades but don’t really know your stuff, then it will eventually show because you won’t be able to solve the problems posed to you.

Take control of your career Approach the management of your legal career as you would a business plan. Think about where you want to be in the next three to five years and then define your objectives for the next 12 months, your strategy for achieving those objectives and the tactics for getting there. Include in your plan what you want in terms of work/life balance, remuneration and the type of environment that you want to work in.